Plot

A homesick, no-nonsense lounge singer decides to leave New York City to spend some time visiting her two sisters and brother on the West Coast. Eventually she falls in love with a down-and-out ex-jazz pianist.

Visiting her two sisters and brother, singer Petey Brown lands a job at small-time hood Nicky Toresca's nightclub. While evading the sleazy Toresca's heavy-handed passes at her, she falls in love with down-and-out ex-jazz pianist San Thomas, who has never quite recovered from his long-ago divorce. While solving the problems of her siblings and their next-door neighbor, no-nonsense Petey must wait as San decides whether to start a new life with her or sign on with a merchant steamer.—Doug Sederberg <vornoff@sonic.net>

Currently based in New York but never having set roots anywhere, streetwise Petey Brown, who has made a decent living as a nightclub singer, feels the need to touch base with family over the Christmas holidays, and pays a surprise visit to her only living relatives, her three younger siblings who live together in Long Beach, California. She ends up staying there longer than she'd planned as she becomes embroiled in the lives of her siblings and their neighbors, mismatched couple Johnny and Gloria O'Connor, who have just welcomed twins. Johnny believes he dotes on Gloria in providing her gifts, and while he works hard to provide for the family, he treats Gloria more like a trophy on his arm than a wife. Gloria is a party girl with nary a domestic or maternal bone in her body, which Johnny doesn't realize. Petey's eldest sister, married Sally Otis, is a hardworking waitress at a spaghetti joint owned by Tony Toresca. Sally has no issue with Tony, but his nephew Nicky, a womanizing club owner, has his eye on her despite knowing she's married with a young-adolescent son Buddy. Sally's husband Roy is currently in a military psychiatric hospital suffering from shell shock. Although she wants to stand by Roy, she's not sure if she can handle his current abusive attitude toward her and their marriage. Petey's younger brother Joey works for Nicky, mostly as a favor to Sally. Joey likes to run with the big boys but doesn't have the wherewithal to deal with any of the implications of doing so. And Petey's youngest sister, 18-year-old Ginny,would rather stay home looking after Buddy and the O'Connors' twins than go out and have her own social life--and secretly pines for Johnny. Petey sees her primary role as running interference with Nicky away from Sally, which she is more than willing to do as she easily gets a job singing at Nicky's club. Beyond the issues that arise within this collective, a further issue arises most specifically between Nicky and Petey as she falls hard for a man for this first time in her life. He is San Thomas, currently a merchant marine she had known of in his former life as a jazz pianist. San is a troubled man, running from his past, still pining after his former wife, which could factor into what he will decide to do with his life: will he continue to run by staying within the merchant marines, or return to playing the piano professionally while giving life with Petey a try?—Huggo

When beautiful torch singer Petey Brown visits her family, she finds a nest of troubles: her sister, brother, and the neighbor's wife are involved in various ways with shady nightclub-owner Nicky Toresca. Tough Petey has what it takes to handle Nicky, but then she meets San Thomas, formerly great jazz pianist now on the skids, and falls for him hard. This is harder to handle: San still carries a torch for another woman.—Rod Crawford <puffinus@u.washington.edu>